I love Galliano, but..

[Thaotran]

This will be a long rant.. I don't know if this topic is appropriate or not, sorry mod if this is not supposed to be discussed.

So these days I've been watching Maria's Dior collections on Youtube and I noticed many comments asking Galliano back. Fine, he is truly talented and I love him too. However, many people define Galliano as the true and only spirit of Dior and that really gets on my nerves.. I was literally screaming in my head when I read a comment stating that Galliano is superior to Monsieur Dior, and the brand Dior is "lucky" to survive because of marketing. And that comment doesn't sound like a troll at all.
My personal opinion is, nobody can replace or do better than Monsieur Dior. People always say that his garments are boring, not creative enough and that Galliano makes Dior happen. I truly disagree. Since the New Look in 1947, the House is already "a thing" in fashion world and Monsieur Dior creations are revolutionary! They still are classy, elegant and the style are still wearable after all these years.

I love Galliano but I have to say that he does do damage to the brand. He makes people think that Haute Couture should be extravagant, theatrical while it's not. I even think that some of his clothes and accessories are cheap looking..

So what do you think? What is the spirit of Dior to you? Do you think that Dior should be extravagant, over the top again?

 

[shoesshoeshoes]

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I think some of his designs were truly beautiful.
But ever since he made those anti semitic comments, not a fan anymore. No matter how talented you are, if you've got a nasty personality, well... thats no good isn't it

 

[averagejoe]

This will be a long rant.. I don't know if this topic is appropriate or not, sorry mod if this is not supposed to be discussed.

So these days I've been watching Maria's Dior collections on Youtube and I noticed many comments asking Galliano back. Fine, he is truly talented and I love him too. However, many people define Galliano as the true and only spirit of Dior and that really gets on my nerves.. I was literally screaming in my head when I read a comment stating that Galliano is superior to Monsieur Dior, and the brand Dior is "lucky" to survive because of marketing. And that comment doesn't sound like a troll at all.
My personal opinion is, nobody can replace or do better than Monsieur Dior. People always say that his garments are boring, not creative enough and that Galliano makes Dior happen. I truly disagree. Since the New Look in 1947, the House is already "a thing" in fashion world and Monsieur Dior creations are revolutionary! They still are classy, elegant and the style are still wearable after all these years.

I love Galliano but I have to say that he does do damage to the brand. He makes people think that Haute Couture should be extravagant, theatrical while it's not. I even think that some of his clothes and accessories are cheap looking..

So what do you think? What is the spirit of Dior to you? Do you think that Dior should be extravagant, over the top again?

I have read some of those comments, too. I've noticed a lot of "bandwagoning" behaviour online (as well as in person). People tend to jump onto these bandwagons of hate. Some examples include people collectively hating Gap's new logo (and getting them to revert back to the old one), and hatred towards Yves Saint Laurent's name change to "Saint Laurent Paris". A group of very vocal people voiced their anger against these changes, and in almost every case, they think the older version is always better somehow.

This is similar to people insisting that there is no such thing as a "supermodel" anymore, and that the last "supermodels" were Naomi Campbell, Cindy Crawford, etc. Some insist that there are no screen legends anymore, and that Grace Kelly and the silver-screen stars were the last legends on screen. The trend (and bandwagon) is to hate the new, and always prefer the old.

Galliano is a strong designer, and brought the Dior brand to huge profitability during his tenure. So it is easy to romanticize his days with the house, and shed hate on his successors at Dior.

I personally loved Galliano. I was quite saddened by his departure from Dior, and the circumstances of that departure, especially with his alcoholism which led him to say those anti-Semitic comments. He coped with feelings of creative highs and crashes with alcohol. As a designer, people expect more and more all the time, and the next effort must blow previous efforts out of the water or else you lose relevance. I'm oversimplifying this, but I think it explains why celebrities have to do a lot to "stay relevant", and it is a tiring pursuit. Galliano explains it well in this interview with Charlie Rose from a few years ago:


I can understand why some people would say that Galliano was better than Christian Dior himself, because after all, Galliano designed for the House of Dior longer than its founder did. Galliano was respectful to the Dior archives, but he also injected a lot of himself into the brand, which is good for the growth of the brand.

Maria Grazia Chiuri, unlike her predecessors who only referenced the 10 years that Christian Dior designed for his own House, offers to reference all of the designers at Dior before her. Her vision makes a lot of sense, since Dior's 70-year history would largely go to waste if everyone keeps referencing the first 10 years over and over again.

@Thaotran to answer your question about whether Dior should be over-the-top again as in Galliano's days, I personally think that it shouldn't, at least not at this moment. There was a time for this extravagance which led to the rise of such "enfant terrible" designers as Galliano, Alexander McQueen, and Jean Paul Gaultier, but that time seems to be over now. Fashion keeps changing, and I would rather a brand change with the times than to be stuck in the past.